October 06, 2012

Robert Manning, Atlantic Monthly editor, 1919 to 2012

"[T]he most important part of an editor's job takes place before the writer has even begun to set words to paper. In commissioning an article an editor must make clear what he is looking for and not looking for without handcuffing the writer with crippling preconceptions. Otherwise, both writer and editor may find themselves in head-to-head combat when the manuscript comes in." — Robert Manning, former editor-in-chief of The Atlantic Monthly, in his autobiography "The Swamp Root Chronicle: Adventures in the Word Trade" (W.W. Norton, 1992). Manning died on September 28 at age 92.